The One I Missed
Einstein wrote that the best musical audience is one that can appreciate Mozart's Piano Concerti, implying of course that Mozart's Piano Concerti comprise the best music there is. When I was a student I was fortunate enough to buy a box set of the complete concerti (in an Oxfam or other charity shop): I think it was Anda's cycle.
Since then I've lived with these works and heard them performed by most of the great pianists--Ashkenazy, Brendel, Bilson, et al. All of them--from the Jeunehomme onwards--are great works, though my favourites are K466 onwards.
Imagine then my disappointment that I missed the greatest concert of all time! It was of K466, the Dminor, in December 1794: the soloist was a certain Ludwig Van Beethoven. No matter that I wasn't yet born--I'm still disappointed that I missed it.
Friday, March 26, 2010
Thursday, March 25, 2010
Silent witnesses
What a way to start a day! I'm sitting in the dining room eating breakfast; my housekeeper is watching the world go past our house. This is what we do every morning. Then, Hawu! she suddenly exclaims. I look left through a window and see a Toyota 4x4 come through my fence, flip upside down, and start rolling rapidly towards my house. By now, the housekeeper is screaming; I'm rooted to my chair, watching the vehicle rolling, my adrenalin racing.
There are people inside the vehicle.
I watch the Toyota turn a few more times then come to a dead stop before a tree stump, ten metres in front of my house.
Miraculously the people survived.
Very quickly there's a crowd by my yard. Then an ambulance arrives; a man from the newspaper arrives; and finally a policeman arrives. The policeman explains that this accident had caused another one a little further down the hill.
Half-an-hour later the people from the car are on their way to the hospital, the crowd has gone, the police and newspaper men are gone; only the broken fence and battered vehicle remain as silent witnesses to the morning's drama.
What a way to start a day! I'm sitting in the dining room eating breakfast; my housekeeper is watching the world go past our house. This is what we do every morning. Then, Hawu! she suddenly exclaims. I look left through a window and see a Toyota 4x4 come through my fence, flip upside down, and start rolling rapidly towards my house. By now, the housekeeper is screaming; I'm rooted to my chair, watching the vehicle rolling, my adrenalin racing.
There are people inside the vehicle.
I watch the Toyota turn a few more times then come to a dead stop before a tree stump, ten metres in front of my house.
Miraculously the people survived.
Very quickly there's a crowd by my yard. Then an ambulance arrives; a man from the newspaper arrives; and finally a policeman arrives. The policeman explains that this accident had caused another one a little further down the hill.
Half-an-hour later the people from the car are on their way to the hospital, the crowd has gone, the police and newspaper men are gone; only the broken fence and battered vehicle remain as silent witnesses to the morning's drama.
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